Saturday, October 1, 2011

Heart 2 Heart Challenges (plus a Card Pattern)!

Ok, so nothing like sneaking in under the wire...I believe I have until 10 p.m. tonight to finish up my challenges for last month, lol. I can't believe I was so sick - It felt really good to stamp the night away tonight. What a bunch of fun challenges I almost missed! I love the Heart 2 Heart Challenges - and the artwork is fab, so go check it out!

The first Challenge for the month was a color challenge, using a fab color combo of Sorbet, Pear, and Cocoa. Since I've got Christmas on my mind, I made a snowflake card using one of my favorite sets, Snow Flurries. It might not be new, but it's just so pretty! I made a similar card to this for swapping at convention this year - that border is hand pieced with tiny strips of Sorbet Cardstock, then sanded and cut with scalloped scissors and hand punched for the border. Insane? Maybe, but it's awesome! And there's something zen about the process of making it, too. I embellished with a bit of Mocha Opaque Pearls, Bitty Sparkles, and you can't so much tell, but the cut out snowflakes were swiped with Pearl Paint, which was apparently my go to tool tonight!


The next Challenge was also a color challenge - to use your favorite color combo! It's like trying to choose your favorite child...how can you do it? So since I've got snow on the brain, I went with my favorite snowflake color combo: Moonstruck, Pansy Purple, and Crystal Blue. Ahhh, Snow! I used Snow Flurries again and stamped the big flourishes alternating down the card front with Crystal Blue Ink. Then I came back with the smaller Snowflakes and stamped them in multiple generations (Meaning 2 or 3 times for each inking) in Moonstruck. Then I sponged Pansy Purple ink all around through my flurry of snowflakes. I topped it all off with a good coat of Pearl Paint - it's pretty shiny in person.I punched that border with a Martha Stewart punch, and added 4 ribbons: a Moonstruck Grosgrain, and three matching fibers. Remember when we had fibers? Finally, I painted some retired CTMH Snowflakes I've been hoarding saving for way too long, painting them with Pearl Paint and adding Pearl Opaques to the snowflakes before adhering them with Liquid Glass and Foam Tape. The layout for the card I got from the Card Patterns Blog, Sketch 135. And my heart was happy...but there's more!

The next Challenge was to use cardstock only, at least three colors! I modified a card I just did with my team, using Desert Sand, Sweet Leaf, and Cranberry cardstocks. I created a "plaid" pattern at the top by dry embossing crossing lines into my Cranberry Cardstock using my paper trimmer and my embossing stylus. Ok - I was too lazy to go get my embossing stylus, so I used a mechanical pencil that had run out of lead. Whew! It feels good to tell the truth! Then I sanded those lines to bring out the white patterns and drew in so additional lines using my Cranberry marker for a casual country-feeling plaid. I stamped the Desert Sand CS with snowflakes and swiped it with a bit of my pal Pearl Paint. I did another of the emboss resist trees (See instructions on my previous post on the Die Cuts challenge), and popped it up with a big ol' sparkle on top. Popped on a Pearl Painted corrugated star and my country Christmas card was complete!

There was one more challenge to go - my favorite! The challenge was to use only a sentiment stamp in creating your card. I think that's such a fab idea! We have so much beautiful paper just hanging around, how bout some awesome, quick cards that we could just pop a sentiment onto and roll with it? Ok, I'm about to use the "P" word - I saw a similar layout for a card on Pinterest. So easy and simple - just a corner rounder to create the flower petals, and some scraps of paper from the new Believe paper pack and I was in business! Once I had rounded and inked all the flowers, I swiped everything with a coat of Pearl Paint - added just the right amount of shine to make this feel even more Holiday. I popped up the teeny-tiny "Celebrate" sentiment from the October SOTM to give it more presence, as I didn't want the sentiment to take over from the clean feeling of the card. Quick, Easy, 5 minute card - truly a reason to celebrate!

4 cards and  5 challenges in one night - not bad for a recovering sickie procrastinator! I think I earned the rest of the evening to go read my new book, A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin...Back tomorrow with scrap layouts for Friday night!

Alos linked to We Have Paper Issues Snow Day!

8 comments:

Lisa Fowler Windsor, CO said...

Blow me away!! Awesome job.

Haley D. said...

You've totally rocked all of the September H2H challenges! I really, really like each of your cards. Thanks so much for getting them in "under the wire!" Congrats! Hope you're feeling better.

Lisa said...

Wow... all beautiful cards.. i love the design of your sentiment only one..

Pamela OConnor said...

Amazing collection of cards! I love how you included all the challenges in one post. =) Thanks for playing along with us at H2H!

Michelle said...

Very pretty snowflakes!
Morning Has Broken

NinaB said...

Beautiful cards, Wendy. Thanks for playing with us at Card Patterns this week.

Leah's Crafty Life said...

Recovering sickie procrastinators are the best. ;) Really hope you are feeling better. Your cards are amazing, simply gorgeous!!! Thanks for linking up with us at Paper Issues!!

Created by Kathi said...

Wendy... found you from a post on Tamra Pope's blog and love your use of the pearl paint! Thanks for sharing:) Kathi

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